


This Is Love (Calling You Out From The Depths Of The Sea)

by aeveee



Category: Power Rangers (2017)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-13
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-10-18 07:11:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10611828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeveee/pseuds/aeveee
Summary: The moments worth noting and the spaces between.





	1. you don't hold my heart (like you run in dark)

**Author's Note:**

> A collection space for prompts completed from [this](http://aeveee.tumblr.com/post/159388328513/send-me-a-pairing-and-a-number-and-ill-write-you) writing exercise.
> 
> Title from 'This Is Love' by Susie Suh.
> 
> Unbeta'd. All mistakes herein are mine.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 29: "I thought you were dead."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title taken from 'Slacks' by Valley.

Trini wakes to the sound of soft breathing out of sync with her lungs and the heartbeat of someone else beneath her fingertips. It takes her a moment - a moment of sea water, wondering if the darkness around her will once again spit out something to throw her away - and if her first reaction is to flinch, well, she isn’t quite awake enough to hide it.

Her second flinch though is an entirely conscious one. There’s a sliver of moonlight slipping between half-pulled drapes that traces across Trini’s floor. Trini follows it up her sheets, along the curved back of a sleeping figure just to her right.

(The last time someone had stayed at her bedside while she slept had been when she was six, shivering and damp from a particularly vicious cold. Her mother’s hand had been gentle on her forehead, keeping the chills away. Trini remembers the Spanish lullaby her mother had sung, the lilt of her mother’s voice.

She can’t remember the last time her mother has stepped foot past her doorway since.)

“Finally decided to wake up, have you?”

Trini starts, looks to find Kimberly watching her with barely open eyes. There’s the curve of a shoulder peeking out from a sleep shirt Trini recognizes as her own and something in the way Kimberly’s soft brown skin looks beneath Trini’s clothes makes her want to shift, to slip away. If it weren’t for Kimberly’s fingers around her wrist, Trini thinks she might.

“Did you sleep well?” Kimberly yawns. She stretches, reaches until there’s the gentle crack of a realigning spine before slumping against the mattress again. Her head is turned awkwardly so she can look at Trini. “It’s actually kind of cold in here.”

“You left the window open,” Trini says after a while. Kimberly pulls her hair out from the lopsided ponytail it’s in, lets it fall wild and loose around her face. Trini thinks of how much younger it makes Kimberly look.

“Huh. Knew I forgot something.”

“Your own pyjamas?” Trini tries.

“To climb in under the covers,” Kimberly answers. It would be teasing if it weren’t for the dark cast of her eyes, the way her fingers press suddenly against Trini’s pulse. Trini remembers, then, the buckle of her zord beneath her and the abrupt give of her armour falling away.

“I’m fine,” Trini says when it becomes apparent Kimberly won’t ask. Kimberly’s fingers press once again against Trini’s wrist, then her palm, then along the insides of her fingers before gently trailing off of her fingertips.

“You’re not fine.”

They stay silent, Kimberly with her head resting on the crook of an arm, Trini sitting still against her headboard. Kimberly’s breathing is even, an in to Trini’s out, a soft huff that slips between the blood beating in Trini’s ears. She can see the stiffness in Kimberly’s spine and the words that have pushed her jaw into a sharp point; not for the first time, Trini wonders just how much Kimberly holds back for the sake of appearing soft, for being kind.

(She wants to tell Kimberly to just spit it out. She doesn’t because she won’t be the only one hurt by that.)

“So are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Kimberly eventually asks. Her eyes are dark and tired and Trini feels the same tug of sleep in her limbs. It’s heavy, insistent - she ignores it in favour of playing with the sheets just by Kimberly’s elbow.

“Maybe. Or you could tell me what you’re doing here.”

Kimberly hums. “There’s a thought.” When Trini doesn’t say anything, she sighs, “Why did you go off by yourself today?”

Trini’s jaw tightens. Kimberly has yet to move from her awkward hunch at her bedside and no matter how much their power coins give them, Trini knows Kimberly can’t be comfortable like that. She frowns more when Kimberly just blinks at her. The heat of Kimberly’s elbow starts to seep into her fingers.

“I saw a couple of putties coming around our flank, didn’t want us to get boxed in. Thought I could handle it.”

“You thought wrong,” Kimberly bites. The suddenness of her anger seems to startle even Kimberly because she blinks, presses her lips together before trying again. “Why didn’t you tell me where you were going? Or any of us, for that matter?”

“They were just a couple of putties,” Trini says.

“We’ve all been thrown around by a couple of putties.”

 _We’ve all been seriously hurt by a couple of putties_ is what Kimberly wants to say but she doesn’t and Trini feels her anger rise, scraping along her ribs, crawling up her throat.

(She’s tired of being berated, tired of being blamed for everything. Not being ‘normal’, not being good enough, just not being. Trini’s mother has gotten really good at saying _where is the daughter that I remember where is my sweet girl_ in every word but those and Trini doesn’t know if she can handle Kimberly being like that. Not when the morph beneath Trini’s skin hums for her, not when something else in Trini hums for her too.)

“Look, I’m really tired. It’s God-knows-what-time and I’m pretty sure I’ve only just slept off the concussion. Can we do this in the morning?”

There is a long moment where Trini’s sure Kimberly’s going to crack. She remembers the sound of Kimberly’s voice in her helmet cutting off as the face plate melted away, the sudden drop of her zord disconnecting from her. There had been Kimberly, turning towards her in her cockpit only to get dragged to the ground by putties launching too-high into the air. There had been the morph ripping through her as it ripped away.

(She’s not good enough. She’s not good enough. For a second, the morph had found that mantra and made it true.)

It had been easy to sneak off afterward, everyone so pre-occupied with her disappearing armour they didn’t think to watch for a disappearing girl. She remembers her stumbling trip from the ship to her bed only in bits and pieces, splintered and ending with the feeling of her pillow hitting her face. She doesn’t remember Kimberly being there when that had happened.

And yet, Kimberly is here now.

“You are,” Kimberly starts. Her voice wavers for one infinite moment and Trini’s heartbeat wavers with it, “so frustrating. I thought you were dead, Trini Herrera. You disconnected from me. I thought you were _dead_.”

“Well, I’m not,” Trini tries, but Kimberly just bares her teeth.

“Not good enough. You can’t do that, Trini!”

Trini flinches - _not good enough, not good enough_ \- and the motion brings Kimberly up short. Her eyes are glassy as she runs a hand through her hair and she throws the mess one way then another. Trini refuses to look at her.

"I’m going to go now. I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to be here.”

“Sure,” Trini says. Kimberly sighs.

“I don’t want to say something else to hurt you.”

“You didn’t.”

“I _did_.”

Trini doesn’t try to deny it again. “Well. Get home safe, then.”

“I’ll text you,” Kimberly says blankly. She seems to consider something for a second before standing, leaning down to press a hard, bruising kiss to Trini’s temple. Her hand grips Trini’s head as she does it and Trini remembers the feeling of her mother’s hand on her forehead, overlays it with the warmth of Kimberly’s. “Get some rest.”

Trini watches Kimberly ease herself out of Trini’s window, tugging it almost shut from the outside. She gives Trini one last look before stepping off the ledge and the quiet night eats her, leaves Trini to wonder if Kimberly had been there at all. The imprint of her lips on Trini’s temple says otherwise.

If sleep eludes her, chased by the hint of tears and the creak of Kimberly’s jaw, Trini can’t find herself to fault anything for it.


	2. i don't always want to play nice (but i want to feel your heartlines)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 6: “Is there a reason you’re naked in my bed?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title taken from 'Heartlines' by Broods (check out [the Race Banyon remix](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RULIJLe1HSc))

Kimberly almost misses it on her first pass. She shuffles into her room, dumps her bag onto the floor and has the hem of her tank top in her hands when she freezes, arms still crossed comically across her torso.

“Trini?”

“Hngh.”

It’s barely a grunt. Kimberly lets her tank top go, moves to the bed where Trini is curled on her side. Kimberly’s boldly pink covers - eight-year-old-Kimberly had been weak to societal expectations but current-Kimberly is definitely learning to rock it - are pulled almost over her head and Kimberly smiles, sure she looks overly fond. “What are you doing?”

“Dying,” Trini groans. Kimberly reaches to gently pull the covers down and comes face to face with Trini’s pout, full and unrelenting, and she would be embarrassed by how thoroughly charmed she is by the expression if she didn’t know for a fact that Trini feels the exact same way about her pout, too. “Either save me or leave me to die in peace. Stop letting the cold air in, you heathen.”

Kimberly laughs as Trini pries her fingers away, tugs the covers back up under her nose again. She looks so small bundled in Kimberly’s sheets, the only things visible the lilting tip of her nose and her hair sticking out at odd angles. It’s only upon closer inspection that Kimberly realizes some of Trini’s hair is sticking to her forehead from sweat and Kimberly frowns, pressing the back of her hand to Trini’s skin.

“You’re hot,” Kimberly says after a moment. She waits for Trini’s inevitably cheesy  _you know it_ but when it doesn’t come, she knows something’s up. “Okay, shuffle over and open up. I’m coming in.”

Trini groans as she moves, rolling a bit and tugging the covers back down again. Kimberly doesn’t miss the way her eyes sharpen when she notices Kimberly taking her tank top off - so maybe she flexes a little, arms and abs on full display. Flaunt it if you got it, y’know? - and Kimberly grins when she’s down to just her bra and panties, expression wolfish. “Like what you see?”

“Just get in here,” Trini grumbles. Kimberly laughs, crawls onto the bed and shuffles until she’s pressed close so Trini can tug the covers tight around them.

The heat of Trini’s little cocoon hits Kimberly immediately and Kimberly feels herself start to sweat. More than that, though, is the silky feeling of Trini’s warm brown skin against her own and it short circuits Kimberly a little. It happens every time, like her body can’t quite handle the beauty that is Trini, and honestly, it would be embarrassing if she didn’t love the swooping feeling in her chest that usually comes with it.

“So what exactly are you doing here?” Kimberly asks once she feels Trini settle against her, one arm tucked between their chests and the other resting easy across Kimberly’s hip. Their legs are pressed together and Kimberly resists the urge to move a little, to slide a calf against Trini, to slip a thigh between Trini’s own.

“Could only make it halfway through school. Decided to crash here so my Mom doesn’t know I skipped.”

“Oh yeah?” Kimberly asks. She brushes a few strands of hair aside, lets her fingertips run along Trini’s jawline to her lips. Trini’s skin is slightly sticky from sweat and Kimberly presses close, feels Trini’s forehead with her own. “Seriously, you are really hot.”

“Stop it, you’re making me blush,” Trini mumbles playfully. Kimberly presses a kiss to Trini’s lips, then another.

“Well, I mean - is there a reason you’re naked in my bed other than for me to make you blush? Trying to play coy, Trini Herrera?”

“Kimberly,” Trini whines. “I feel like I’m dying.”

“Are you saying I’m making you ill?”

“Well _something_ is,” Trini sighs. “Honestly, the one time I semi-blow out my powers and I somehow manage to catch the school cold? Really?”

“Serves you right for pushing yourself too hard at training. And when we had to deal with those putties by Billy’s house. And after when you challenged Zack to - ”

“Okay, okay, we get it Miss Prim-and-Proper, you can stop reciting your lines now.”

“You know, if I didn’t love you so much I would be seriously displeased right now.”

“God forbid,” Trini drawls, but there’s something in her expression that’s so, so soft and Kimberly smiles into their next kiss, tastes the _I love you too_ on Trini’s lips as easily as if she had said it out loud.

Later, when Trini seems to be drifting on the cusp of sleep and Kimberly has slipped her arms around her, pulling her flush against her front and combing her fingers idly through Trini’s hair, Kimberly remembers something.

“Wait. The school is going to call your house and leave a message that you missed class anyway. What was the point of coming here? You’re still going to get in trouble.”

“’m trying to sleep, K,” Trini mumbles. “Le’me sleep.”

“Trin, come on.”

“I have a girlfriend who is supposed to sneak into my house to delete the message before my parents get home. Not supposed to get in trouble.”

“I’m not doing that.”

“Sure.”

“I plan on keeping your parents’ continual affection for me intact. I am not sneaking into your house.”

Trini is awake now. She wriggles a little, presses herself even closer to Kimberly and wriggles a little more. The feeling of her skin on Kimberly makes Kimberly flush a blotchy, mottled pink and Trini grins at the sight even though her eyes are hazy from sleep and she herself is a flushed from being sick.

“I’ll make it up to you somehow. A very pleasant, creative how. What do you say, Hart?”

There’s a foot slowly trailing up Kimberly’s calf; Kimberly fights a shiver. “You play real dirty, Herrera. Real dirty.”

“There’s a reason I’m naked in your bed,” Trini winks. Kimberly slips a hand to the back of Trini’s neck, tugs her in so she can kiss the laughter from her lips.

“Also,” Trini murmurs once Kimberly finally moves on from her mouth, pressing kisses to her cheeks, her nose, the cute lilt of her chin, “I wanted someone to be with me while I’m sick. Been a while since I had that.” A quiet breath - Kimberly knows she’s thinking of her mother, wishes things were a little simpler, that the Herrera women were a little better with each other. “I feel better when I’m with you.”

Kimberly pulls back at that, eyes wide, dark and searching across Trini’s face. “Maybe it means your powers are coming back.” There’s a wild stuttering in her chest, and those weren’t the words Kimberly had meant to say.

“Maybe,” Trini hums, as if she’d heard the _am I good enough am I really good enough_  anyway. She dips back in, presses a kiss to Kimberly’s lips, then another one, hot and wanting. “Or maybe you just make everything better.”

Kimberly arches into Trini, hums at the quiver of sound that slips from Trini’s mouth. She’s about to run her hand up Trini’s side, fingertips teasing, when Trini shakes, muffles a sneeze against Kimberly’s shoulder.

“You know, I’m a little mad you started this when you’re sick and you clearly can’t follow through.”

“It is what it is,” Trini says sagely before catching another sneeze in Kimberly’s shoulder, completely unrepentant.

“Disgusting.”

“You love me.”

Kimberly smiles, kisses Trini’s temple and then the shell of her ear. “I do.”

And then:

“I’m still not sneaking into your house for you, though.”

Trini laughs. “We’ll see.”


	3. did we light too many matches (turn ourselves into these ashes)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt 45: “Tell me a secret.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title taken from 'Walk Through the Fire' by Zayde Wølf (ft. Ruelle)
> 
> I am Chinese and what little I know about fire and Hinduism is limited to what one friend has told me and reading from the internet. Please let me know if I have written anything incorrect and I apologize in advance if anything is wrong and/or offensive.

Kimberly tells her this a week after Rita, when the nightmares start and Trini wakes from shaky gasps and the high pitched screech of bending metal.

“In Hinduism, fire means both life and death. We burn things in offering, we burn things to celebrate. We burn things to join together and to leave our loved ones. Fire is a part of life, in every life.”

Trini listens to Kimberly’s voice, deepened by the rasp of sleep.

“My mother told me this when I was seven. We were at my cousin’s wedding and the ceremony was taking too long, I kept asking her why we still had to be outside, why there was a fire. To be honest, I haven’t really thought about it until now.”

“Does it help?” Trini asks. Her heartbeat has since slowed, trickled into a distant patter instead of the roar in her ears. Kimberly hums.

“I don’t know. I’ve never really felt… connected with my culture, I guess. I can’t really -” Kimberly pauses. “It’s hard to say.”

“Oh,” Trini says. “Okay.”

“I know that doesn’t help -”

“No, Kim, it does. Thank you.”

“Okay,” Kimberly says. “Okay. Try to go back to sleep, Trini.”

“Yeah.”

Kimberly hangs up after long minutes, sure she’s stayed on long enough for Trini to fall asleep. Trini, for her part, only lets her breathing quicken from the soft, even hum she remembers from her brothers once the dial tone has gone on for a least a minute. She spends the rest of the night wide-eyed, sheets thrown off in the cool night air.

She feels like she’s burning, anyway.

–

It doesn’t come up again until Zack suggests another campfire, backpack clinking with dented food cans and half-finished liquor bottles. Trini helps him set up by lining up their buffet of food choices on a nearby boulder and checks some of them with a few sniffs before pulling a face.

“Not safe to eat?” Kimberly asks from behind. Trini turns, startles a little at how close Kimberly is. Kimberly winces and takes a wide step back.

“No, just - not a big fan of -” Trini turns the can over in her hand, “sweet Thai chili tuna.”

“Sounds delicious if you ask me,” Kimberly says. There’s a half-grin tugging at her lips and Trini finds herself returning it, shoulders loosening though her stomach still feels tight. Kimberly starts to say something but is drowned out as Zack reaches their campfire zone, arms laden with branches and twigs and plywood gathered from broken pallets from the quarry.

“Hey lovebirds, help a dude out and start the fire!”

Trini turns to snap at Zack - something about her absolutely  _not_  being a lovebird, something about how the idea of her and Kimberly together is ridiculous - but Kimberly has a warm hand on her wrist and Trini feels the words stutter away.

“You jealous, Taylor?”

“You wish, Hart. You can keep that crazy girl all to yourself.”

Kimberly laughs - a light, tinkling thing - and Trini feels warm, in a way that has nothing to do with her jacket, nothing to do with the way Kimberly brushes her fingertips over her pulse point before letting go.

Billy and Jason have gotten the fire started and Trini stares at it, feels her breathing go noticeably uneven.

“Hey.” Trini looks up. Kimberly is watching her with wide, careful eyes. “Come sit further back with me. I don’t want to go home smelling like smoke.”

“Okay,” Trini says. She’s grateful for the way Kimberly doesn’t smile, just sheds her leather jacket and lays it out on a boulder for Trini to sit on while she goes off to gather two of the foldable lawn chairs she’d donated a few months back. Trini helps her set them up, picks up Kimberly’s jacket and dusts it off before giving it back to her.

“Thank you.”

She means it for the jacket, for the chair, for the gentle and kind understanding and the words that have stayed behind the curve of Kimberly’s mouth.

“Hey, anytime.” Kimberly says. “I prefer to admire from afar anyway.”

Trini watches the light flicker across Kimberly’s face and thinks that if that’s the case, she’ll understand why Trini won’t let herself get any closer to Kimberly than this.

–

It takes her seven tries to call Kimberly. She wants to call Zack first, aches for the broadness of his chest, the quiet Chinese lullaby he hums until her breathing evens out with his, chests rising and falling at the same time.

“Sometimes when my mom is having a rough night, she’ll hum this to herself. I picked it up when I was ten and now I do it for her so she can just focus on breathing, you know?”

Zack in the night is quiet, full of longing, full of worry. He sleeps in his room sometimes, sleeps with his cot pressed against his mother’s door others. Trini has spent a few nights curled up with him and she knows intimately the feeling of his fear in the tightness of his arms around her, in the way he sometimes stiffens when his mother’s breathing changes.

“She always tells me to go back to sleep but I can’t, not really. Sometimes I’ll just sit outside the trailer by her window so I can still hear her but also so I can just, I don’t know - just run if I need to, I guess.”

“I get that,” Trini says. Zack tucks her head under his chin and tightens his hold, until she squirms and he laughs a little.

“Having you here really helps. Makes me feel like even if I fall asleep there will still be someone to catch her if she falls.”

“I’ll always be here for you, Zack,” Trini mutters into his chest. Her throat feels oh-so-tight. “For you and your mom. We’re friends for life.”

“Yeah,” Zack says. “Yeah.” Then he starts to hum.

Trini wants to feel that warmth again, wants to hear his voice, feel the rumble of it in his chest against her ear. Instead, she scrolls until she finds Kimberly’s number in her contacts and stares at it, thinks of how Zack’s mom has gotten better in the past week and she should leave them alone, give Zack some time to enjoy the lull.

Kimberly picks up on the first ring, as if she’d been waiting.

“What’s up, buttercup?”

“I regret calling you,” Trini grumbles immediately but there’s a bit of laughter in her voice, echoed by Kimberly’s sleepy chuckle. “Did I wake you?”

“Nah,” Kimberly drawls. There’s shuffling on her end and then, “I mean, you did, but it’s a good thing. I fell asleep studying. My neck thanks you for your kind service.”

Trini huffs a laugh, focuses on the morph until she can feel Kimberly through it, muted and quiet and just at her fingertips. She focuses more until Kimberly feels like a cool balm on her overheated skin, pressed close and forgiving. She closes her eyes, tries to slow her breathing so she can just be.

“Hey,” Kimberly says after some time. She sounds muffled, like her mouth is pressed up against something. Trini imagines Kimberly lying curled up in bed, face half buried in her pillow. “Hey, you still there?”

“Yeah,” Trini hums. “Sorry. I should let you go.”

“No, you’re good,” Kimberly says. There’s the sound of a yawn and some more rustling and then Kimberly says, “Do you want me to talk or do you want to just lie here together?”

Trini feels her ears heat at the question - they’re not lying together, not quite. She curls further into her own pillow, tries to muffle her words but also prays fervently that Kimberly will hear them so she won’t have to repeat herself. “Let’s just… can we just sleep?”

“Sure,” Kimberly says, easy as ever. She shifts again, probably to get into a more comfortable position, and Trini tries to do the same. “Night, Trin.”

“Night.”

When she wakes up to Kimberly’s alarm clock blaring distantly in her ear and the sound of Kimberly’s sleep-rough, “Good morning, beautiful. I have to hang up now,” Trini tries to ignore the way her stomach flips, focuses instead on how the warm cocoon of her blankets feels comforting for the first time in weeks.

–

She thinks, at some point, that she should be more afraid of water. 

She remembers the feeling of droplets on her forehead falling from Rita to her, the grey chalkiness of Billy’s skin even after he’d spit everything out from his lungs and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. The water took something from them and it had almost been permanent. If there’s one thing she should be more afraid of, it’s water.

But then, but then - 

Billy came back. She survived Rita. The water gave them a bond, after, and before - well, before Trini didn’t feel like she had much to lose.

The fire though, Trini remembers, was just fear. Fear as Zack faded out, fear as Kimberly gasped for air that almost wasn’t there anymore. Her last conscious thought had been that if this was it, she was happy but also so, so mad because she finally got here - in this place, with these people - and now she wouldn't get to see things through.

(At least her brothers would still have her parents to keep them safe. At least they’d have each other. At least they’d still be alive.)

Trini wakes from another nightmare of the flames melting her zord and rushes to the sink, splashes cold water onto herself until she stops feeling like she’s burning, until she remembers that she’s here. 

She’s still here, with the rest of them. It barely feels like enough.

–

“Have a sleepover with me.”

Trini looks up from her Biology textbook to meet Kimberly’s eyes, deep brown and a little mischievous. There is a smear of sauce on the corner of her mouth and Trini doesn’t need to look to know Kimberly has eaten the last of the pizza again.

“Why?”

“Why not?” Kimberly asks.

“I don’t know,” Trini shrugs. “Maybe because you live in the middle of nowhere which means I’ll need to wake up earlier just to get to school. Maybe because my mom would freak. Maybe because you snore. A multitude of reasons.”

“First of all,” Kimberly says but she stops when Trini motions with her hand, moves to scrub at her face with the inside of her wrist. “First of all - ”

“Yes, princess?”

“ _First of all_ ,” Kimberly growls, and Trini laughs. “You’re already here in this quote-unquote middle of nowhere, so why not stay. I’m driving you so you don’t have to worry about getting up too early. Your mother loves me. And I do not snore.”

“Yes, you do.”

“I really don’t. Just say you’ll stay, Trini Herrera. Stop playing hard to get.”

Kimberly’s staring at her with a look Trini likes to think she would wake up to if they woke up beside each other instead of across Angel Grove with only a tinny cell phone connection between them. Her chest tightens at the thought.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“What? Playing hard to get?”

“Sleeping over.”

Kimberly sighs. “Look, is this about the nightmares? Because I know and I just - wouldn’t it be easier if you just slept here, with me, instead of having to call later?” Trini watches as Kimberly’s head ducks down, lip caught between blunt teeth. “What I mean is - I worry about you.”

Trini bites her own lip, swallows. Her fingers clench in time with the roaring in her ears. “I don’t need you to worry about me.”

Kimberly looks up. “Trini.”

“Don’t do that.”

“Can I tell you a secret?”

Trini sighs, tries her best not to pull away when Kimberly shifts forward, face open and earnest. “Tell me a secret.”

“I’m glad that fire happened. I’m glad we fell into that pit, that we burned together, rose together, because we survived it, we’re  _here_. Remember what I told you, about fire in my culture? We were joined together, in that fire. We rose completely new. _You’re_   _here_ ,” Kimberly says, then quietly, “You’re here with me.”

Trini watches as Kimberly slowly reaches out with a hand, slowly, carefully runs just the tips of her fingers along the back of Trini’s.

“Stay,” she says. “Stay here with me. Let me worry about you.”

Trini’s heart thunders in her chest. Kimberly’s watching her, ever so careful, but for the first time, the heat beneath her skin doesn’t feel like it’s going to eat her alive. Instead, Trini watches as Kimberly gently runs her fingers up until she can curl them around Trini’s wrist, turning her hand until it’s palm up, sliding their fingers together. It feels like coming home.

“Okay,” Trini breathes, after long silent moments.

“Yeah?” Kimberly smiles. She looks soft, so achingly uncertain.

“Yeah.”

“I’ll get you a toothbrush,” Kimberly says, and she slips her fingers from Trini’s, unfurls herself from the couch with a grin. Trini watches her go.

So maybe the fire could have taken it all away. Maybe, for a few moments, it did. But it gave her something, too, and as Trini breathes in deep, catches the scent of Kimberly’s perfume, feels her in the thrum of her skin, in the morph singing within her chest, she thinks of Kimberly and her mother’s words and finally,  _finally_ , she feels herself be.

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to send more prompts [my way](http://aeveee.tumblr.com/) from [this](http://aeveee.tumblr.com/post/159388328513/send-me-a-pairing-and-a-number-and-ill-write-you) list.


End file.
